


i've always been this way (please don't scream)

by Mister_Fox



Category: Bleach
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Not Human, M/M, Tentacles, but not the kinky kind
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-25
Updated: 2020-05-25
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:34:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24285952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mister_Fox/pseuds/Mister_Fox
Summary: “Ever wanted to snatch a pigeon out of the sky and eat it?” Kisuke asks idly.Ichigo glances up from the homework spread over the counter in the shop. He’s not sure why Kisuke hired him to mind the shop during this summer break, when Kisuke’s in it nearly all the time anyway and could cover Tessai’s absence just fine by himself. And it’s not like Ichigo needs an excuse to come over anyway, no one ever seems to feel like kicking him out.“Is it another thing I don’t know about my heritage but you do that you’re expecting to manifest?”Kisuke laughs, hiding his face with the fan. “If there is anything more interesting left in your ancestry, it is as unknown to me as to you.”UraIchi Week 2020 - Day 2, Different Species.
Relationships: Kurosaki Ichigo/Urahara Kisuke
Comments: 25
Kudos: 329
Collections: UraIchi Week 2020





	i've always been this way (please don't scream)

Kisuke is a smart street rat.

It only takes two spooked farmers and one beating by two drunk men that he barely escapes to realise that there’s something very, very wrong with him. That he’s not normal. That he’s a freak.

It’s easy to hide what’s wrong with him, at least, under the large stolen green haori that’s nearly more patches than fabric, at this point, and longer than he is tall. He tucks everything away (and he’ll later learn that what he does doesn’t make sense, shouldn’t work - but he’s too young to know that now).

As long as no one knows, he is safe.

As long as he keeps everything hidden and stays away from people, he is safe.

As long as he is safe… all he has to worry about is where the next meal is going to come from.

* * *

He walks along the market stalls, looking hungrily at the food on display. He hasn’t eaten in a while, and the smells are delicious.

The shopkeepers are all eyeing him warily - him, and the dozens of other loitering children scattered around the area. Him in his rattier clothes, perhaps a little more than the rest.

Kisuke hovers around a stall selling mochi, vaguely passing his arms too-close to the wares, perfectly visible to the man manning it, and pretends to not notice the way he is being paid attention to.

After a short while, the man’s patience wears thin.

“Hey, I can see you, street rat. Show me your hands!”

Putting an innocent expression on his face, Kisuke turns his hands palm-upwards, stretching them over the rows of wrapped delights to show the stall owner, the edges of wide sleeves just barely above the goods.

As the man frowns at hands that are clearly clean of flour or any sticky sauce, he doesn’t notice a handful of small treats - nothing that would be noted as absent at first glance - vanish into those wide sleeves, into small pouches and napkins to avoid stains on his clothes. He doesn’t have a spare set, and getting this dirty would be a waste.

“Stop hovering here,” the man eventually says, frowning at him, and Kisuke leaves, cheerfully absconding with the stolen delights. Not leaving too quickly to look suspicious, of course.

There’s a shout from somewhere to the left. Kisuke turns. A yelling woman is walking along the street, calling out for someone to stop hiding and come to her.

Someone, suddenly, grabs Kisuke’s arm.

“Lead me out of here so we don’t get caught, and I won’t say that I saw a mochi go up your right sleeve,” whispers a girl in pretty, fancy clothes, her golden eyes glittering wickedly.

Kisuke flinches away, as much as the tight grip on his arm will allow. How much did she see? If she-

Well.

He nods mutely, and leads the way, putting a small group of shoppers between himself and the lady still far off at the end of the street.

The noble lady follows him as he weaves through the crowds, down the street and then sharply through a narrow gap between buildings, emerging in an empty backstreet where it's easy to shimmy up a pile of crates to reach the roofs, and then move along them, invisible to the passers-by in the street who are unlikely to look up - as long as no tiles fall and no noise is made, of course.

After a while, they reach a small, quiet area with no one outside, and sit down on a nice, tall roof, where passers-by probably won’t look for them.

"This one thinks it may be beneficial for the presence that is so magnificent and impressive to be condensed into a smaller area-" Kisuke blanks on how to address someone who is so much higher rank than him and fakes a coughing fit instead. "That may be how your minder is following you."

The red not-mist-not-light that surrounds the noble lady is exceedingly luminous and curls around them both and drapes over the edges of the roof, bright and visible, and likely easy to see.

She blinks at him and tilts her head curiously.

"What are you talking about?"

"The... the light? The coloured mist? I am unsure of what the proper word for it is." Did he say something wrong?

The noble closes her eyes and concentrates. The red around her bleeds out of the air until there's only a little bit left, tinting the air around her in a much smaller radius.

"Is there a difference?"

"This one doubts that they would find you as easily now."

She opens her eyes, staring at him curiously. "You can see reiatsu?"

Reiatsu? Kisuke hasn't heard that word before.

"This one does not know what you are referring to."

"It's spiritual pressure - pressure exerted by reiryoku, spiritual energy. Do they not teach that out here in the middle districts of Rukon?"

Spiritual energy... that explains why most Rukongai residents don’t have the mist. Reiatsu. Very few have spiritual energy.

"I am Shihouin Yoruichi, Heir of the Shihouin Clan. What is your name?"

One of the great noble houses? Oh no, why? He is not very good at the whole talking thing and with such a highly ranked noble...

"This one goes by Kisuke, Shihouin-sama. It is an honour to make your acquaintance."

Something small glows on the sleeves of Shihouin-sama’s clothes, like the stamps on some merchandise he’s seen transported through the district, marking on some items in the markets. The signs that seem to make it so easy for the owners to track down the thieves.

“How did you steal those sweets at the market? I couldn’t recognise the kidou or the effects of it. Could you demonstrate?”

Kisuke freezes.

Shihouin-sama reaches for something hidden in one of her sleeves and pulls out a small wrapped package that smells faintly of food. “Are you hungry? You can have this if you get it from me like you stole the food.”

If this goes badly… well, he can simply run away. It is doubtful that a noble such as the Heir of one of the Five Great Noble Houses would care to pursue him, and it is unlikely he would be in any more trouble than if he was discovered helping her run away from her escort anyway.

Tentatively, Kisuke lets one of his tentacles snake out of his right sleeve, reaching for the treat. He quickly plucks it from Shihouin-sama’s grasp and withdraws the tentacle.

She watches him with curiosity, and something he doesn’t quite... recognise.

“That is not a kidou. Do you have more of those?”

Kisuke let more of them escape his sleeves, the thin, black, whip-like limbs twitching at the strangeness of being exposed to air, for once.

“These must be pretty useful. Can you do anything else with them?”

“I can break… I think they’re called kidou seals? Like the ones on your clothes. I can do that by hand, but it is faster.”

“Can you show me?”

He reaches for the seals, gently catching the edges and tugging on them until they spark and unwind into nothing.

“Kisuke-san, how would you like to never need to steal food again?”

* * *

Yoruichi never mentions her new friends’ tentacles to anyone in her family, and by the first time he gets injured and needs a medical exam, they’ve long since found scrolls that teach illusion kidou in the family library.

They practice them until they can hide the tentacles to every sense including touch, as long as Kisuke keeps them pressed tightly against his back.

They’re useful for a great deal of trouble- and for constantly disabling all sorts of security kidou so the two of them can sneak in and out of places. Even if Kisuke can be such a spoilsport about riskier endeavours.

Not that she can’t, reluctantly, understand why. If the two of them get into genuine trouble, the consequences will be worse for him.

But even if they do get in trouble, she’ll always protect him. He’s her friend.

Even if he’s a pretty weird friend who once almost ate a bird he caught out of the air.

He’s her best friend.

* * *

Yoruichi goes into the Onmitsukido after they graduate Shinou academy. Kisuke doesn’t quite have a choice, exactly, he knows too much, but he goes for the Second division instead of the Onmi itself. There is not that much difference, in some ways. In others, being on the administrative and reconnaissance side of things is… better. It draws less attention and leaves him with more time for experimentation and science.

Even if he does also get prison guard duty these days, with which comes the privilege of knowing what happens to those who think differently, who have ideas, or who are… strange and unusual in ways that are not easily explained.

* * *

The eyes come in when he hits what he estimates to be his hundred and fiftieth birthday.

Tessai averts his gaze after a few moments of looking at the change.

Yoruichi keeps looking at him, determined to remain unphased, even as blood trickles out of her nose until Kisuke closes his new eyes, and they vanish from his tentacles and from- they are not on his skin, and yet they are not floating, and he does not know how to explain that.

“Well, that’s… new,” Yoruichi says, eventually. “What can you see?”

“I haven’t tested them much yet.”

“What are you waiting for?”

* * *

The Hougyoku grows in him like a tumour until he takes it out- that’s what he thinks it is, anyway, until he removes it.

It is… more like an organ, whose function he does not recognise, one that has been there always, just… lesser. It feels like the cause of the changes, the strange, unfamiliar substance of it similar to his other-eyes, to his tentacles.

He does not need any more differences, any more changes, but there might be a great many things such a strange item could do.

He can’t wait to find out.

* * *

Kisuke should feel at least a little grateful for the fact that souls don’t remember their lives once they’ve been in Rukongai for long enough. He got there as a child, must have died as a child. And since he can make an educated guess as to why he died… it is likely little that would be pleasant to remember.

On the other, having to rely on nothing but what mere genetic memory can communicate is… well. He knows nothing of culture or history or language or anything - if there is anything to know.

But without memories, all he can do is make conjectures about which of his relatives got either a very unlucky encounter, or was the kind of person to, as they say, get freaky with an extra-dimensional creature of ineffable biology and indescribable physiology. And that doesn't make it easy, now that he’s fortunate enough to be stranded in the living world, having escaped Soul Society, to even try to track down any information about his life, his relatives, anything.

It might even make it impossible.

Not that he doesn’t have the time to waste, of course.

With the Hougyoku so drained and damaged by using it to stabilise the Visored, he can’t take it back into himself - but neither has he yet found a way to destroy it. Or fix it, for that matter.

He has so much time, and maybe if he learns more… Maybe, he’ll learn something useful.

He feels very tired with the Hougyoku so drained. Lethargic.

Like it was still a part of him, even removed.

* * *

He wishes he could get more… touch. He doesn’t know why he craves it so badly, why his body melts, and relaxes at it. Maybe it’s something to do with how one of his human ancestors managed to sleep with an Old One and live to tell the tale, something to do with his eldritch inheritance. If he thinks very hard, he can almost remember, a strange being whose purely eldritch descendents tangle and ravel and unravel around each other, many-limbed and strange and tactile, communicating and transferring emotion and thought and information with a mere touch.

With Yoruichi usually away to sneak around Soul Society, he is lonely, and he… doesn’t like it.

But humans don’t seem to take to his extra limbs any more happily than souls or shinigami. Or, at least, not the kind of happy he wants.

* * *

Kisuke does not understand the trend for the fetishisation of tentacles in recent human culture, he never will. He understands, intellectually, that people who are into them like that exist- but it’s like a person being into a nostril. He doesn’t get it. They’re just… limbs.

And he would appreciate it if Yoruichi could stop springing material of a sensitive nature involving tentacles on him to watch his, what does she call them, excessively amusing reactions. He really would. His reactions are not entertainment.

And pulling a similar stunt with materials involving catgirls does not, unfortunately, produce a similar effect on her.

Maybe he should put catnip into her food again.

* * *

Aizen fixes the Hougyoku for him, merging it with.... something that isn’t quite what Kisuke had. Aizen’s version is forged from thousands of souls, of traces of a heritage distilled to mimic a proper inheritance.

Aizen has a stronger will, a stronger desire.

But the Hougyoku belongs with Kisuke, and he plucks it from Aizen’s bound form as it is transferred to prison.

It is time to hide it where it should have never been taken out of.

And then he’ll find a way to repay his debt to Kurosaki Ichigo.

* * *

The merge puts him in a three-year sleep as his body desperately tries to adjust, and catch up on a century of growing wrong.

Coma, Unohana-taichou calls it.

Hibernation and a well-deserved rest, Yoruichi mutters under her breath.

He curses out his heritage, as he tries to put together an apology for Kurosaki-san about how long it’s going to take to get him his strength back.

* * *

“I don’t need it,” Kurosaki-san says simply. “It’s… been a while, and, I’ve learned to get by, you know? It’s okay. My friends can protect themselves just fine. They're not helpless.”

Kisuke feels something inside him deflate.

“I mean, you can still figure out if it’s possible, but… I’m not sure I’d take you up on the offer if you do. I’m going to university this autumn, and, honestly, I don’t think I want trouble to follow me all the way to England. The best way to protect the friends I'll make there would be by not dragging them into supernatural trouble.”

That is… a long way away, but yes. If his powers are not restored, he should have quite a quiet time of it.

“If you want to do me a favour, I guess you can let me do homework over at your shop, or something. My sisters and Dad are… well, studying at home right now is a bit of a pain.”

* * *

Ichigo graduates school, gets accepted into university, and still finds his way over to the shop for reasons he makes up when he gets there.

Kisuke is usually the only one around- or the only one wearing a gigai, anyway.

When Ichigo goes to university, he has a strange, sleek phone with one number in it that he hadn’t had before leaving.

* * *

How are my sisters doing? - K.I.

Fine. Karin-san is doing well with her training. - U.K.

Good. Are you busy right now? - K.I.

I am preparing some mochi. - U.K.

How on earth are you typing on your phone like that?? - K.I.

* * *

“Ever wanted to snatch a pigeon out of the sky and eat it?” Kisuke asks idly.

Ichigo glances up from the homework spread over the counter in the shop. He’s not sure why Kisuke hired him to mind the shop during this summer break, when Kisuke’s in it nearly all the time anyway and could cover Tessai’s absence just fine by himself. And it’s not like Ichigo needs an excuse to come over anyway, no one ever seems to feel like kicking him out.

“Is it another thing I don’t know about my heritage but you do that you’re expecting to manifest?”

Kisuke laughs, hiding his face with the fan. “If there is anything more interesting left in your ancestry, it is as unknown to me as to you.”

It’s the truth, of course, with Kisuke it is rarely anything but. It’s just not the relevant truth, because he’s asked the wrong question.

“Also, no, I’ve never thought about eating a pigeon,” Ichigo says, just in case. “Although, now this question is all I’m going to think about every time I see one, so thanks for that.”

* * *

There’s a group of people that’s started following Ichigo around.

Well, they’re not a group following him - not, like, literally a group of people following him.

But several faces grow familiar to him, try as they might to blend in and walk at a distance, and that’s one hell of a feat considering how face blind he is.

It’s one thing in university, where, conceivably, they might live nearby and have a similar schedule and thus have a reason for being where they are a regular time.

There’s at least two of them, and possibly a third, but Ichigo’s not sure.

In Karakura?

Well, him having genuine stalkers is starting to sound like a more likely option.

“Kurosaki-san, are you aware that you seem to have gained some admirers?” Kisuke asks him lightly as they walk to the shop, Ichigo lugging a disproportionate amount of the groceries.

“Oh, you can see them too? They’ve followed me here from England, I think.” Ichigo tries to sound nonchalant, although… well. If Kisuke’s seen them, they’re there, and it’s not Ichigo’s faulty facial recognition making strangers look more familiar than usual.

“I shall keep an eye on them, Kurosaki-san.”

“Be my guest?”

* * *

“Give it back!”

Ichigo looks up.

A person is running out from an alley, followed by a tall man, shouting at the- thief? Ichigo sticks out a foot to the side as the thief passes him, and sends the guy sprawling to the ground. The guy drops the bag as he scrambles to his feet, and runs on.

“Thank you for stopping the thief,” the man says.

“You’re welcome.”

“I am Ginjou Kuugo. May I return the favour by buying you some ramen?”

Not that Ichigo is one to be rude, exactly, but he was planning to have dinner elsewhere.

“Thanks, but I’m kinda busy.”

“In that case… well, perhaps you should drop by that shop you work at occasionally. You might see something… interesting.”

And what is that supposed to mean?

Ichigo shrugs internally. He was going to Kisuke’s place anyway.

Something falls from the stranger’s bag.

A substitute shinigami badge.

Huh?

* * *

Karin is walking along the street ahead, clearly heading home from training.

She nods at Ichigo as she passes.

Suddenly remembering the strange guy’s warning, Ichigo frowns and looks around. Karin’s probably more than a match for anything interesting. He, himself?

Good question.

“What a shady character, that shopkeeper is. What do you genuinely know about what he does? You shouldn’t trust him. Have you noticed you’re being followed? I think he may be keeping an eye on you.” The guy is standing almost right behind Ichigo, making him scramble away. The fuck.

Wait, was Ichigo supposed to be surprised by Karin visiting the Shoten for training? And why would Kisuke have him followed - if he wanted to know where Ichigo is, he could probably track him by the phone, or something. What even...

“I don’t exactly trust you, either.”

“Well, that’s not surprising, I suppose. Here, just in case - my business card.”

Ichigo takes the card - black, with white writing.

What the hell is Xcution?

* * *

“Ishida’s been attacked today, something weird happened to Orihime, and I still have the calling card from the weird dude who says I shouldn’t trust you because I don’t know everything about you,” Ichigo says, tapping on his phone as he calls Kisuke.

There’s a soft sigh from the other end of the connection.

“What do you think I should do, Getaboushi-san?”

“...I am not sure. There is something very strange about this entire situation. Getting in contact with this… Xcution may reveal more information. Alternatively, I could try finding and following them myself?”

Ichigo thinks.

“Nah, I think they’re probably too suspicious of you. Well, it’s not like I had anything more interesting to do this summer break.”

“If you go to them, call my voicemail to record whatever happens. It may be interesting.”

“Sure.”

* * *

Kisuke frowns as he listens to Ichigo’s meeting with these… Fullbringers.

A hereditary trait to manipulate souls and structures, awoken in the offspring by Hollow attacks on the parents?

Minor… from Ichigo’s constant loud questioning about everything, minor inhuman traits that manifest when the power is unleashed?

His tentacles coil and uncoil around his arms in unease.

At least, should the worst come to it… he does have that power-infused sword. If Ichigo will genuinely need the power to defend himself? Kisuke will make sure he will have it.

* * *

With the… game they’re playing with the Xcution, Ichigo has to stop coming to the shop. He’s not sure why he feels sad about that, exactly, but… He does.

His phone pings with a text message.

He stares at it for a solid minute, not even taking in the contents of it.

The font has been changed to imitate… the same kind of ridiculous blood-stain like writing Kisuke likes to use for his wall messages.

Seriously?

Sending a request to meet in a restaurant like that?

Well, he can go, and tell Kisuke in person all about his new Fullbring ability. And that confrontation with the Tsukishima guy. And the weird…and familiar vibe all the Fullbringers have.

* * *

Ichigo goes to the specified corner table in the restaurant- which turns out to be already occupied. He’s about to apologise for walking over, when-

“Sit down, Kurosaki-san. It’s simply me.”

Ichigo stares.

With his hair tied back in a neat ponytail, and dressed in perfectly average modern clothes, Kisuke is downright unrecognisable. But, definitely not… a bad kind of unrecognisable.

“What is this, a date?” Ichigo asks, sitting down.

“I thought it might be nice to plan what to do about the Xcution in person.”

Kisuke isn’t saying no.

But… it can’t, like, actually be a date.

“And there are some things I’d like to give you, just in… case. I didn’t want to drop them off at your house.”

Okay, everything makes sense now.

* * *

Kisuke’s phone beeps, as Ichigo’s phone tracker sends a notification that he’s going somewhere far off the beaten track.

Just like all his friends have been vanishing over the day.

Everything’s about to go down now.

Hopefully, the Gotei will get there even faster than Kisuke to back Ichigo up.

He needs to pick something up first, just in case, if this is going the way he thinks it is.

* * *

A Fullbring that changes memories. It’s only the fact that Kisuke’s going to arrive any minute that stops him from freaking the hell out at the way his friends and family are all defending this Tsukishima guy. Especially when his supposed ally Kugo is probably in league with this dude.

He’s not sure what Kisuke can do, exactly- but he has faith in him. And Kisuke has said he has something that would probably work to snap people out of these… altered memories, like a very hard reset to the brain. Ichigo hopes Kisuke’s plan doesn’t involve giving everything a concussion, and hoping that sorts things out.

“-you should really apologise to Tsukishima-san!”

Deep, deep breath time.

He can do this. He needs to stall and preferably get these guys out of the same room as his family.

...He could fake a breakdown and run upstairs.

That would be pretty easy right now.

He’s half-way up the stairs, when-

“Apologies for my tardiness, Kurosaki-san!” Ichigo doesn’t think he’s been happier to hear Kisuke’s voice in his life. “I had to go pick something up before I could meet up with you.”

“No problem, I knew you’d come.”

With the Xcution upstairs, or on Ichigo’s side of the room-

Yeah. They can probably spring the entirety of whatever this trap is.

“You shouldn’t trust him,” Kugo whispers into Ichigo’s ear. “There are things you do not know about him.”

“If you will indulge me for a second by paying some attention to me-” Everyone is looking at Kisuke now, the interruption to whatever script Tsukishima had set up in this place. “Thank you.”

Ichigo can feel it a second before it happens, that same weird vibe he feels around the Fullbringers, and Orihime, and Chad, but so much stronger, he can taste the ozone and copper and sea salt in his mouth, his nose is clogged with the smell of blood and petrichor-

And then he doesn’t know what he’s looking at.

It has- eyes. Somewhere. Limbs. Thin, spindly reaching black tendrils like tree branches or a root system.

So, so many eyes.

And there is- there is-

He’s shaking his head, there’s blood dripping from his nose and onto his chin, and the images slip away.

He’s not the only one.

“What just… wait, Tsukishima attacked all of us, we need to run from here!” Yuzu shouts.

Ichigo takes the opportunity to tackle the fucker to the floor, as Kugo stands next to him, trying to clear his head, and everyone- mostly everyone, except Chad and Orihime, run from the place.

A mind-breaking illusion, huh. So that’s what Kisuke meant by a hard reset.

There’s a sharp, burning pain in the middle of his chest, and he looks down.

There’s a sword sticking out of him.

“We’d hoped to temper your power a little more before I took it, but, alas… Well, we did not plan for this interference.”

He slips off the sword as Kugo shakes it, flinging him across the room as his power is ripped from him. But he doesn’t crash into the wall.

Something catches him, like a web or a net, maybe, and then-

Urgh, stabbed again, already?

And then he feels a familiar power rush back in.

So, rather, he’s being stabbed by a shinigami sword again.

Kisuke helps him to his feet, and Ichigo realises what caught him. Dozens of thin, trailing black tentacles spill from his sleeves and the edge of his haori, giving off the same feeling of inhuman as the Fullbringers’ more… interesting traits.

“Hey, did we miss the party? We saw a lot of screaming people run away.”

Ichigo looks through the door to see Renji. And Rukia, and Byakuya, and Ikkaku, and other shinigami. Kisuke went full-out in terms of getting back-up, huh?

Right. Time to beat this lot of smug fucks up. He can say hi to them all later.

* * *

Ichigo doesn’t bring up the tentacles. It’s not deliberate, exactly, but- if Kisuke was comfortable enough with him to show them, he’d be doing so, and if he’s not- he has every right to keep them a secret, because damn, but Ichigo doubts those have ever been well-received by anyone.

Although, when they go to eat takoyaki together, Ichigo can’t help but wonder how closely Kisuke is related to what they’re eating, during yet another of their not-dates-and-not-just-friendly-meetings. They’re not… dating, exactly, but they’re also not __not__ dating because Kisuke’s given him one brief kiss on the cheek and that’s a thing that only couples do- but also they haven’t done anything much more romantic than that. And Ichigo is very much confused about this entire arrangement.

But he does have one, sort of related question.

“So, what were the Fullbringers, exactly? They gave me this… weird vibe and I still don’t get it.”

Kisuke pauses and then finishes eating his mouthful of ramen.

“I think they are all distant descendants of… I call them the Old Ones. They are not… human, or hollow, or anything of the sort. Strictly speaking, I am not certain they are alive in the same way we are alive. Sometimes, they… interact with our world, through agents or manifestations, and sometimes those interactions lead to hybrid offspring.”

Ichigo takes a moment to digest that.

“Are they hostile?”

“Not particularly, I believe. Merely curious. The cuddly octopus-like lineage, at the very least. I cannot say for certain”

“Why would you say they’re distant descendants?”

There’s a momentary pause.

“Closer relatives may… possibly be more obviously related. Visually, and behaviour-wise, less human.”

Ah. Right.

Wait.

Is that what the pigeon thing was all about? And also…

“Cuddly octopi?”

* * *

Ichigo watches Kisuke squirm where he sits on the couch next to him, trying to lean back against the pillows, but seemingly unable to do so comfortably.

“You don’t have to keep hiding them if you’re that uncomfortable, Kisuke-san,” Ichigo says, finally. “I saw them when you caught me during the fight with the Xcution.”

Kisuke is silent, seemingly thinking hard. “It is not hiding them that is the source of my discomfort. But if they do not bother you…” Black tentacles creep out of the sleeves and from around the back, where the seams along the back of the clothes are a clever disguise for hidden zippers because apparently there’s an opening in the back of the clothes to let the tentacles out.

They look… duller, greyer than when Ichigo saw them last. Last time, he didn’t exactly have an opportunity to examine them. This time though...

“Could I… touch them?”

Kisuke blinks at the request, eyes widening. If Ichigo didn’t know better, he’d say Kisuke looks surprised.

After a moment, a few of the black tentacles move in Ichigo’s direction, drifting strangely in the air right next to his hands.

He reaches for them.

They’re silky smooth and soft and supple in his hands, the colour shifting like oil. The twist and wrap around his fingers, far more flexible than he expected, more like… ribbons, or something, than real body parts. They almost recoil from his touch, shivering away, but then press against his hands again. Almost like they’re unused to affection, but also hungry for it.

Still, they’re drier, and a little greyer than when he’s seen them before, and the skin feels almost.. cracked? Like with eczema. Is that the source of the discomfort?

“Is there anything I can do to help you?”

Kisuke tilts his head thoughtfully, his eyes half-closed. He looks unusually relaxed, almost spaced out, and answers slowly.

“I had an accident in the lab and had to decontaminate quite thoroughly. But that amount of washing is not very good for the skin on my, ah, non-standard limbs. I have some cream that would help if it was applied. Yoruichi-san or Tessai-san do it for me, sometimes, but they’re both busy at this moment. I was going to do it later, but...” Is Kisuke blushing? Kisuke can’t be blushing. But there’s a faint tinge of pink to his cheekbones.

“Okay. Where can I get some?”

After a minute spent retrieving it from a medication cabinet, Ichigo sits down next to Kisuke, showing him the bottle to check that it’s the right one.

“Thank you, Ichigo-san. Once the colour is almost shimmery, you’ve applied enough.”

The cream is warm in his hands, and slightly tingly, but Ichigo pays it no mind as he rubs it into that strange black skin, the tentacles pretty much melting in his hands. And he thought they were relaxed before.

Ichigo takes the opportunity to ask a question that has been bothering him for a while.

“Have you ever snatched a pigeon out of the sky and ate it?”

Kisuke stills, and then groans.

“I was drunk, and it was only one time. It’s a particularly unpleasant memory that I have been trying to forget. Feathers… do not taste good. Yoruichi-san is yet to let me forget it, however.”

Ichigo will take that piece of advice for the future. Never do anything embarrassing in Yoruichi’s presence, that is, not the feathers thing.

As he works through the tentacles one by one, he notices that Kisuke is tilting progressively further forward, almost like he’s too relaxed to stay upright. And that there’s a soft, musical hum coming from him.

Weird.

The tentacles are just so many floating limp noodles now. The ones that aren’t casually wrapped around his arms and wrists, clinging to warmth. They seem to wilt in sadness when he tries to push them away, so he sighs, and lets them keep at it. They’re not doing any harm, exactly.

As Ichigo works closer and closer to Kisuke’s actual back, he wishes he had a spare hand, or maybe tentacle, to take a photo. As weird as this all is, he thinks it might be… a nice memory to keep.

By the time he’s reached the join between pale and oil-black skin, Kisuke’s pretty much folded up in what can’t be a comfortable position to keep for any length of time, but he seems far too floppy to get out of.

Ichigo frowns, as he realises how soft and even Kisuke’s breathing is. Like he’s actually fallen asleep.

Well, in that case, Ichigo might as well maneuver him to be lying down on the couch properly to sleep, while he finishes the... maintenance. He can wake him up once they’re done, so they can watch the movie they planned to see.

The musical hum hasn’t stopped, though. Is that the eldritch monster equivalent of purring, or of snoring?

Could be both, of course.

Either way, it’s pretty adorable.

Now he just needs to figure out a way to free himself from the tangle of eldritch limbs so he can put away the cream.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos are welcome and much appreciated, and help me write!  
> Here's a link to [Cywscross' UraIchi Server](https://discordapp.com/invite/ADFnKTZ#_=_)


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